


Sharp as the Devil Himself

by sarahjeanne21



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, H/C sort of, Hurt Sam Winchester, Sam Winchester Has Self-Worth Issues, Sam Winchester Whump, Torture, dean comes through in the end
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-14
Updated: 2018-11-14
Packaged: 2019-08-23 19:11:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,804
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16624787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarahjeanne21/pseuds/sarahjeanne21
Summary: The hunting world has gotten wind of Sam's part in raising Lucifer. They also know Dean and him split up. They would like some retribution for the end of the world.(Sam develops an unhealthy relationship with death.)Season 5 episode 3 AU.





	Sharp as the Devil Himself

**Author's Note:**

> (disclaimer: takes some lines directly from the show, don't own it, just wanted to keep things accurate)

Humans are sick.

Sam had been walking back from the bar when they'd jumped him. There was a rancid smelling sack on his head when he came to. He was tied to a chair. Sam breathed deeply through his nose and waited.

“Good morning, sunshine,” a man said, accompanied with a punch to the gut. Sam grunted, curling over the hurt. He stayed, slumped in his chair until the bag was removed from his head.

“Oh, sorry. Didn’t know you were already awake.” The man was in plaid, his hands were rough and scarred. He was broad, and the other two men in the room were as well. They each looked at him with disdain, necks high, each marred with scars of their own.

They were hunters.

“We know what you did, Sam.” They were in a warehouse. It was freezing cold, empty but for scrap metal and cardboard boxes cluttering the sides. The only light source was a dim bulb above Sam’s head. The walls were concrete and water damaged. It smelled like moth balls and mold.

“Who’d a thought, John’s boy. Of all people. Who got you to go dark side?”

“Who cares. You fucked up, Sam. We hear even big brother’s given up on you.” Sam breathes. He eyes them each in turn. Just a bunch of angry men, trying to find some justice.

“Guys. This is a misunderstanding. I’m out, just. Leave me alone and you’ll never see me again. I’m done.” Sam was tired. He didn’t want to have to explain himself. He’d fucked up.

“You ended the fucking world, kiddo. You don’t get to be done. Do you know how many families we’ve seen slaughtered because of this? How many clean ups we’ve had to go through to try to set this shit back in balance? That’s on you. There is no getting benched, at this point.”

“I know. I know. I was trying to help, I never meant for any of this to happen.” What had happened to him? He was tied to a chair, getting grilled by hunters. _Sam_ was a hunter. He was supposed to be the one doing the grilling. He felt sick. This was too much.

“Doesn’t matter how sorry you are. We’ve watched friends die, Sam. Apologies don’t fix that.”

“We’ve been hearing things. About you and demon blood.” The man who punched him looked repulsed, daring him to say no. Sam doesn’t.

“God. I told you, Jack.” The men behind the guy in plaid laughed. Sam finally had to look away from the men.

“Huh. You really are a freak. Never thought anyone could go so far.” He bends down and waits until Sam looks him in the eye again. “We heard your eyes went black.” Sam’s breathing is speeding up and he can pretend it’s in anger, but God. What if they were right?

“You’re willing to bet a man’s life on gossip?” Sam asks quietly.

“Tricky question there, Sammy. Do you think you’re still a man?” Sam flinches at the nickname. He keeps his mouth shut.

“Look. John was a good guy. We’ll make this quick.” And before Sam could say another word, they put a bullet in his head.

* * *

He woke gasping for air, the bang of a gunshot on his tongue, blood dribbling out of his mouth and a raging headache. He was still tied to the chair.

“Fucking Jesus H. Christ!”

The men were lounging around the corner of the room, cleaning up. It couldn’t have been more than two minutes. He didn’t have time to wonder what the fuck had just happened before there was another shot to his neck. This time, he went out slowly, gasping for breath through a windpipe with a hole in it, choking on blood, searing pain in his neck.

“Sam.”

“What the fuck?”

“Sam. Calm down.”

“Who are you?”

“You know who I am.”

“Lucifer.” His stomach dropped. Was he finally in Hell?

“You are a hard one to find, Sam. Harder than most. I don’t suppose you’d tell me where you are?”

“What do you want with me?” Sam demanded.

“Thanks to you, I walk the earth. I want to give you a gift. I want to give you everything.” Lucifer smiled. Sam noticed he had strangely warm eyes.

“I don't want anything from you.”

“I'm so sorry, Sam, I--I really am, but Nick here is just an improvisation. Plan B. He can barely contain me without spontaneously combusting.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Why do you think you were in that chapel? You're the one, Sam. You're my vessel. My true vessel.”

Fuck.

“No.”

“Yes.”

“ _No_. It’ll never happen.”

“I'm sorry, Sam. But it will. And when I do, you will let me in. I’m sure of it.”

Sam was the true vessel of the Devil. Was that-- Was that why he was so fucked up? Because he’d been born that way? How far had he really fallen and how low had he been set up from the beginning? Shit. Sam was evil. No matter how virtuous he tried to be, he was evil. And he couldn’t stop himself. But still, he could try.

“You need my consent.”

“And you’ll give it. I can help you, Sam. Dying isn’t exactly pleasant. Tell me where you are.”

“Fuck off.”

“I owe you one. C'mon. For old times sake.”

“Wait. Are you-- are you doing this? What’s going on? Are you bringing me back?”

“Of course. Can’t have my best suit collecting dust in the closet. I need you alive, Sam.”

Sam exhales in a punch. He look plaintively at the sky. He knows no one is looking back down at him.

“Go to Hell.”

The Devil laughs delightedly. “I like you, Sam. This is going to be fun.”

Sam wakes up sputtering, coughing and spitting out the blood clogging the back of his throat. It hurts, to come back. His eyes sting. When his eyes finally clear and he can breath again, he looks up to three men crouching around him.

“You really fucked yourself up, didn’t you?” One of them--Jack-- says. He looks like he wants to spit on Sam.

“You really aren’t human anymore, are you?” The one in plaid shakes himself out of his stupor and stands up, pulling a knife out of his back pocket. “Well, boys. You know what we do to his kind.” Sam was a monster. He knew it. Explaining the situation, him being brought back because he was Lucifer’s vessel wasn’t going to help anyone. And who's to say he was still human? He said nothing.

* * *

 Sam didn’t know how long he’d been there. They’d been killing him over and over. They tortured him with no refrain, they knew the damage wouldn’t last and they were angry.

Knives, fire pokers, drills, nail guns. Sam could list more. Humans were really sick.

They wanted to know how far they could go. They cut off toes and fingers. Hands. Lucifer always put them back. Sam screamed, he’d been losing his mind. He screamed for Dean, he screamed he was sorry, he screamed out like a confessional. He hated himself. He deserved it. He was so damn sorry. He didn’t want to do this anymore.

Lucifer kept cropping up. Sometimes when Sam was dead, sometimes when Sam was in between deaths. He was in the room with Sam, looking at the instruments the men had found to use on him. Things Sam had never seen before. Things that almost made him sick. He would ask Sam to tell him where he was, if nothing else, just so he could kill the stupid bastards. Lucifer was pissed, the gall of humans to defile his vessel that way. Sam didn’t know if he was losing his mind for real or if Lucifer had finally found him. Both thoughts terrified him.

The third man was standing over him, arms folded. They were alone.

“Remember me, buddy?”

Sam did. He’d hunted with him, just before he’d left for college. He’d been an old hunting friend of John’s. Sam had liked him. He’d been nice, one of the few hunters his dad knew that made an effort to make him and Dean feel welcome. Part of the team. His name was Kelly Andrews.

“You know, this whole thing is making me pretty sick. You were a good kid, Sam. Polite as hell. And smart, too. I remember that.” He bent down to look Sam in the eye. One of them was swollen shut. Sam was wheezing. He was pretty sure a fractured rib was poking his lung.

“Have--Have you heard anything about Dean?”

Kelly looks at him. His face gives nothing away.

“What happened to you? How did this happen, kiddo?” Kelly lifted a hand to Sam’s bent head. He signed. “You know, just after we heard about the Devil getting out, me and a couple old buddies went on a hunt. Looked routine enough.” Sam looked up. “It wasn’t. They didn’t make it.”

“Kelly, I--” Kelly ripped his head back by the hair and slugged him. Sam felt a crack.

“Shut up, Sam.”

He left Sam with the weight of every single ripple effect death he had caused. The death toll was insurmountable, no doubt. They were playing right into Lucifer’s hand, not that Sam would tell them that. Not that they would listen.

* * *

 

“You really should take a break, Sam. You’re not looking too hot.”

“Just send me back.”

“What? No stubborn defiance today? No holier than thou lecture?”

Sam squeezed his eyes shut, laughing at his own desperation. How long could he do this? “Please.”

Lucifer looked at him a moment longer. “You really do think you deserve all this, don’t you?”

“Shut the hell up.”

“No, Sam. You really don’t.”

“I said shut up.” Lucifer sighs and points over Sam’s shoulder.

“You should get some rest. It’s been months, Sam. You really need a break.”

Sam doesn’t trust it for a second. He really tries not to. He’s about to tell Lucifer to shove it, but he doesn’t. He’s been dying for months? Where was Dean? Where was Cas? What was going on out there? He looks over his shoulder, a king sized bed. God. He’d been slumped over a chair for months, apparently. He looks back and Lucifer is gone. He’s glad, because his eyes are wet. He was just tired, was all.

For the first time in months, Sam falls asleep.

* * *

He wakes up with a scream in the back of his throat. His chest was aching, his temples were vibrating. Ah. It had been the drill again.

Everyone was waiting for him.

“You were out a long time, Sam.” Jack pokes him with his gun suspiciously. Sam almost rolls his eyes.

“Look. You guys don’t really know what you’re messing with, right now. You’re in over your heads.”

Jack scoffs. “Just because were not the Winchesters doesn’t mean we’re idiots. We’re fucking hunters, Sam. Been doing this since for twenty years.”

“Fuckin' asshole Winchesters,” the other one grumbles to Kelly, who is staring at Sam. “Well. Whatever you think you are that we shouldn’t be messing with, we found a way to make you stay dead. How do you feel about that, Sammy?”

Sam’s shoulders slump. _Thank god._ Maybe it would actually work. They’d be heroes, really. Taking out the devil’s vessel. Sam prays to whoever was listening (no one, always no one) that it would take.

* * *

It’s excruciating. Whatever spell they found. Hours and hours of senseless pain, he can’t even remember his own name. He didn’t know why it was happening. He didn’t know anything past the feeling of being about to burst, he absolutely could not stand one more second of it, and yet. It wouldn’t end.

Finally, when it did start to fade away, he wept in relief. He remembered Dean, suddenly, and his heart yanked for his older brother. Sam would end like this, in Dean’s eyes. He’d never know what happened, just that Sam had stopped answering the phone. The last memory would be of how thoroughly Sam had ruined himself, how he’d willingly signed himself over to the Devil. He’d never see Dean again and he screamed for it.

When he wakes up he’s in a hole, covered in salt. They must’ve gotten pretty close, that time. He was waking up slower, he wasn’t gagging on blood and his chest didn’t ache like something had been shoved back inside it. He cracked his eyes, four figures standing six feet above him. Match in hand. He didn’t let himself breath. Gasoline, first. It splashed into his nose and mouth, the wet almost made him shiver in the cold night air. He didn’t move. He was so scared. He hated fire, he really did.

They dropped the match. Every part of him burns at once. Inside his mouth, his eyes, his arms and legs. Dean had accidentally set his jeans on fire once, when they were much younger, but it was nothing like this. It seared him to the bone, and again he lost sense of himself. The smell of burning flesh hit him in the stomach. He bit his tongue from the screams because he was supposed to be dead. Playing dead is hard when you’re dying. He thinks of Jess. He thinks of his mom. He burns alive.

* * *

Lucifer is staring at him. His eyes are slitted. They stare at each other for a while. Finally, Lucifer sidles up him with a soft ‘I'll see you soon’ in his ear.

* * *

The earth was soft. Sam was inside of it. It had been recently dug out and filled back up, so it gave a little when Sam wormed his way around. He was terrified. He breathed in dirt and had to cough it back out, which made it worse, he couldn’t breath in anything except dirt and there was six feet of it pressing down on him, his chest ached, Sam couldn’t fucking _breath_ \--

* * *

When Sam woke up, he was still in his grave. He breathed slowly. Wiggling around, trying to get his arms some room to work, Sam realized his situation. He couldn’t tell if he was making progress, he couldn’t tell if he was going in the right direction, he couldn’t tell if his eyes were open or closed. He thought he might be crying. Fuck, Sam was tired, he was aching all over, he felt too large. He was distinctly aware he was alone. No one knew where he was and he couldn’t even die, he was going to be digging himself into the earth forever. He scrabbled frantically at the dirt, trying not to hyperventilate, trying not to be frustrated at the unrelenting pressure on every part of his body, wondering how long he should give himself before he switched directions.

He’d never been claustrophobic but there was barely any air for him to find and there was no room to move. He’d been wriggling for hours, it felt like. He was going to be trapped underground until he died. Which he did, a few times, before his hands finally broke through, finally felt the cool night air. He dragged himself out of the earth, almost screaming with the effort, the ground opening up around him like an eruption.

He clawed himself out with the last of his strength, muscles shaking under the strain, he sucked the fresh air like a dying man, he was a dying man, had been a dying man. He started laughing. It's choppy with lack of breath, it's hysterical with lack of oxygen. Hes panicking. He was breathing too hard, and he was definitely crying, maybe he was still screaming. He laid himself flat against the ground, as spread out as he could get, taking up as much space as he wanted, stretching his ruined muscles for all they had. He had the distant thought that he was ripping himself apart.

He wanted to look for Dean. He wanted to see Dean. They’d picked hemispheres. Sam was alone, of course. He hadn’t forgotten. He‘d lost his phone, anyway (and all his money and Dean’s laptop, he didn’t know where he was). His energy was gone. He couldn’t move a muscle. He would lay there until some unlucky bastard stumbled on his ruined body. He was done. He was done. He wasn’t going to die again. He couldn’t take it.

Cas showed up, eventually. He looked at Sam’s sprawled form, he watched him weep in alarm.

“Sam?” Sam rolled his eyes over Castiel. They were never, really, on good terms. He didn’t want the angel to see him like this. He couldn’t help. Angels. Weren’t really all they were talked up to be, in the end. Heaven was a bit of a farce.

Cas stooped down, making to scoop Sam up, but Sam flinched away violently. He cried out, his muscles really were in a sorry state.

“Be calm, Sam. I am taking you to your brother.”

Sam wanted to tell him no, he wanted to tell Cas they weren’t talking anymore, but he didn’t really want to. He closed his eyes as Cas ushered him up gently, like Sam was a spooked animal. Like Cas was some sort of benevolent angel here to absolve him.

Cas zaps them to a motel room.

“Sammy?”

“Dean,” Sam says, he feels like he’s finally breathing air again, Dean’s here, he’ll take care of it, he’ll take care of Sam--

“What the fuck did you do, Cas?” Dean yells, rushing over to the bed Sam was now on.

“I found him in Oklahoma, Dean. He was… like this.”

“Sam? What happened? Are you okay? Can you hear me?”

“I’m, ‘m fine, Dean, it’s alright now--” Sam tried to smile up at him, his big brother, he never thought he’d see him again. “Fuck, fuck. I was-- I was dead. I’ve died a lot, Dean. I’m really scared. I don’t feel so good, actually--” He was crying again, he could taste it. He was shaking, too, his tense muscles aching with each shiver, but maybe this was all just a fever dream, or he was dead with Lucifer still, or he really had lost it.

“Jesus, Cas-- He’s delirious. Can you do something?”

Castiel concentrates on Sam, moving toward him immediately and Sam is out again.

* * *

He wakes up. He feels like he’s always waking up but he’s never sleeping.

“Hey there, kiddo. How’re you feeling?” Dean voice is gruff, his eyes are looped in dark circles. He looked like he hadn’t been doing much sleeping, either.

“Dean. Are you-- What happened?”

“You stopped answering your phone a few months ago, Sam. We figured you’d either burnt it or something bad had happened. Been lookin' for you for months, man. Cas finally found you. In Oklahoma. You were, uh, in pretty bad shape. He said-- it looked like you’d been buried.”

“Yeah. I--” He has to stop. He’d been buried alive. And that wasn’t even the worst of it.

“Hey, hey hey, stop. Calm down. You’re alright now, me and Cas aren’t gonna let anything happen. Just breathe.” Sam nods. He takes his time, a hand over his aching chest, and slows himself down. He was fine.

“What the fuck happened, man?”

Sam panics again. Dean is angry. He knows it’s not at him, but he’s reminded of why they split up. He’s reminded of Lilith, and how royally he’s fucked up and how many people he’d affected. How badly he’d let Dean down. Blood was on his hands and he wasn’t looking too pretty. Last he’d checked, Dean was pissed. And now, irony of all ironies, Sam was Lucifer’s vessel. And he had to tell Dean.

“Hey, c’mon. You’re good, Sam.” Sam rubbed his eyes in frustration, he couldn’t keep his thoughts in place. He couldn’t think straight. He couldn’t even breathe properly.

“Where’s Cas?”

“He had to go. We’re, uh, looking for God.”

“God?”

“Yeah.”

Sam starts laughing. Dean stares at him for a second before laughing a bit too. “I know.”

The humor dies as suddenly as it began. Sam really feels sick. He didn’t want to think about God, just then.

“You hungry?” Sam thinks about it. He hadn’t eaten in months, as it happened. He nods.

“We’ll go get breakfast. Something greasy.”

* * *

They go to a diner. Sam orders something light, his stomach couldn’t handle anything more than a salad. Dean gets coffee.

“Sam-” he’s staring at his coffee mug, swirling the contents around and around“-I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have split us up. I don’t know what happened to you, but it wasn’t good. And I should’ve been there-”

“Dean,”

“-It’s my job. I take care of you. We watch each other’s backs no matter what. You’re all-- We’re all we have left. And I, uh, I felt pretty shitty. About what you’d done, but I’d also felt really shitty about what I’d done. And I didn’t want to, uh, think about it. I was being stubborn. And I had a lot of time, there. Four months, actually, to think about it. I thought you were dead, man, and I realized-- it doesn’t matter. I know how you feel about it, I know you feel like shit about what you did, too-”

“ _Dean_ -”

“-and I should’ve told you. It’s okay. What you did. I mean, it’s not okay, but it wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t our fault. We got played. You’re a good guy, Sam. You’re the best guy I know-”

“Dean, _stop_ -”

“-look. I just wanted to say I’m sorry. And you should stop blaming yourself, I know you still are, and the demon blood thing was bad but we’ve gotten through worse-”

They hadn’t, they both knew it, and Sam was begging him to stop. It was too much, he didn’t deserve forgiveness but he’d been craving it like a junky for almost a year. And it was too fucking much.

“Please, stop,” Sam says, and he hates it, he hates himself when tears finally drip down his cheeks, down his chin, into his salad. He didn’t deserve any of this.

“Fuck, Sam.” Dean looks lost. He looks like he wants to put a hand on his shoulder, or something, but he stays in his seat and lets Sam cry.

“Just--I’m sorry, Sam.”

“No, no. It’s okay. I’m just, I’m really glad to see you.” Sam smiles weakly, rubbing at his eyes again. Dean sighs. He still looks lost.

“Yeah, man. Me too.”

* * *

They were looking for any news of the apocalypse when Sam came across a mutilation in Arkansas. Three dead. Strung up by their entrails.

Lucifer had killed them. A present for Sam. His stomach turns, and he flips to the next headline without reading the article.

**Author's Note:**

> hm. does this feel finished to you guys?


End file.
